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This was filmed around June 19, 2009 at the B. Bernice Young Elementary School in Burlington, NJ.

Lyrics
========
Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama
He said that all must lend a hand [?]
To make this country strong again
Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama
He said we must be clear today
Equal work means equal pay
Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama
He said that we must take a stand
To make sure everyone gets a chance
Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama
He said Red, Yellow, Black or White
All are equal in his sight
Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama
Yes
Mmm, mmm, mm!

Barack Hussein Obama

segue to

Hello, Mr. President we honor you today!
For all your great accomplishments, we all [do? doth??] say "hooray!"
Hooray Mr. President! You're number one!
The first Black American to lead this great na-TION!
Hooray, Mr. President something-something-some
A-something-something-something-some economy is number one again!
Hooray Mr. President, we're really proud of you!
And the same for all Americans [in?] the great Red White and Blue!
So something Mr. President we all just something-some,
So here's a hearty hip-hooray a-something-something-some!
Hip, hip hooray! (3x)

The Liberals would have went ballistic if this had happened with George Bush.

You got to be kidding me with this trash post! Actually, the liberals would have been labeled "anti-American" and accused of supporting the terrorists. If you compare the policies of Stalin and Chairman Mao, you see that they had more in common with the Bush administration than with the Obama administration. I am speaking directly about the violation of our civil rights, which I would assume you hold dear to you. Still, the comparison to the Bush administration and the Obama administration is unfair and so absurd that it boggles the mind.

I am neither a liberal or conservative. The facts speak for themselves. The Bush administration left this country in a FAR WORSE position than when they can into power. The Obama administration has been accused of everything under the sun and they have not even been in power for one year! Why don't you just be patient and support this administration for a change! Let us see if they can actually improve things. If they can improve things, I just wonder if you will acknowledge it?

Let's not get all wild-eyed and crazy here. Bit of difference between Obama and Mao/Stalin/Hitler.

While I don't think school children should be singing songs about any living president (or former president), I'm also willing to bet that some school somewhere did the same for President Bush...and President Clinton before him, and Bush Sr. before him.

Well, I'm not American, and as such I found the Republicans horrible and frightening and had hoped and prayed for Obama to win. I support him about 5 million percent over the previous administration...

BUT... I completely agree about the cult of personality.

I don't follow American politics enough to see who's driving it (is it actually the presidents office? democrats in general? some of it seemed to have started with parts of the black community?), but from here it seems excessive and unhealthy and also like it will hurt him in the long run (expectations are just too high -- there's little chance a mortal human can live up to them).

On the other hand, I've always, since I was a child looked at the American attitude to their elected representatives with some confusion -- presidents always seemed to me to be treated and spoken of more like a medieval king (i.e., almost reverantly when people speak of them, with an almost unimaginable to me amount of pomp and circumstance and power and religious-seeming awe ) than like anything I associated with a democracy... I have heard things I found pretty much equally weird and creepy as this about each president in my lifetime, so I don't actually know if this is actually all that different than usual or just one of those 'crazy American things that I'll never really understand because I didn't grow up there'...

But I do find the whole Obamamania thing pretty weird and over the top, even while I like and support the guy. I don't think noticing that there's a huge cult of personality requires you to be particularly right wing or particularly paranoid.

Let's not get all wild-eyed and crazy here. Bit of difference between Obama and Mao/Stalin/Hitler.

While I don't think school children should be singing songs about any living president (or former president), I'm also willing to bet that some school somewhere did the same for President Bush...and President Clinton before him, and Bush Sr. before him.

I not talking about policy or ideology, I am talking about developing a cult of personality and the similarities used by Stalin and Mao. I did not mention Hitler.

Although I'm really getting the impression that no matter how much the campaign and president's office etc might be happy that their guy is being spoken of this way, and perhaps happy enough to capitalize on it, it's not primarily a matter of some kind of magical or big-brother-like propaganda campaign.

If you want to point the finger at someone for the kids singing thing, what I've read makes it more of a teachers and principals leaping on the opportunity of a young black well-educated good-looking powerful role model for their kids, especially their young black kids, and these teachers (and to some extent parents) delighted to have a 'celebrity' they can point their kids to other than basketball players and athletes.

I would be surprised if you did not realize that both Mao and Stalin developed a "cult of personality" as part of their plans in ruling in an authoritarian manner. The "cult of personality" of Mao and Stalin was part of the policy and ideology. Would you like to proffer any proof that the Obama administration is intentionally doing the same thing? In absence of that, it is profoundly disingenuous to try and compare Mao & Stalin regimes with the Obama administration.

Trying to make references to Hitler is as just an disingenuous as the initial post. How about giving this kind of nonsense a rest? Instead of this nonsense, how about sharing with all of us what you are personally doing to help get our country out of the hole that it is in. Maybe, just maybe we can create a thread drift that is truly positive in nature.

If you want to point the finger at someone for the kids singing thing, what I've read makes it more of a teachers and principals leaping on the opportunity of a young black well-educated good-looking powerful role model for their kids, especially their young black kids, and these teachers (and to some extent parents) delighted to have a 'celebrity' they can point their kids to other than basketball players and athletes.

I agree that Obama is a role model for young black children just as Justice Clarence Thomas and Condolence Rice are. This goes way beyond being a role model or celebrity.

Why she named her book "I Am Barack Obama".
"The most important thing I think, and the reason the book is called I Am Barack Obama, is because I like when children say I am Barack Obama," Carney-Nunes said. "They understand that there is a little bit of Barack Obama in all of us." Charisse Carney-Nunes

I stand corrected and I apologize. I still stand behind everything else. There is a BIG difference between the exuberance of people and an enacted, political agenda.

Marc Abrams

If it was just the exuberance of a few there would be no problem but it isn't. Just as the ACORN scandal is not a few "part time idiots" in one location this is not a few exuberant teachers in one location. As my post about Charisse Carney-Nunes shows there are organized people with some connection to Obama using official school functions.

Here are excerpts from a speech (World Economic Forum in Caracas, Venezuela. in 2006 ) by Bill Ayers who along with Obama served on the Chicago Annenberg Challenge;

"I began teaching when I was 20 years old in a small freedom school affiliated with the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. The year was 1965, and I'd been arrested in a demonstration. Jailed for ten days, I met several activists who were finding ways to link teaching and education with deep and fundamental social change. They were following Dewey and DuBois, King and Helen Keller who wrote: "We can't have education without revolution. We have tried peace education for 1,900 years and it has failed. Let us try revolution and see what it will do now."

and

"As students and teachers begin to see themselves as linked to one another, as tied to history and capable of collective action, the fundamental message of teaching shifts slightly, and becomes broader, more generous: we must change ourselves as we come together to change the world. Teaching invites transformations, it urges revolutions small and large. La educacion es revolucion!"

If it was just the exuberance of a few there would be no problem but it isn't. Just as the ACORN scandal is not a few "part time idiots" in one location this is not a few exuberant teachers in one location. As my post about Charisse Carney-Nunes shows there are organized people with some connection to Obama using official school functions.

Here are excerpts from a speech (World Economic Forum in Caracas, Venezuela. in 2006 ) by Bill Ayers who along with Obama served on the Chicago Annenberg Challenge;

"I began teaching when I was 20 years old in a small freedom school affiliated with the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. The year was 1965, and I'd been arrested in a demonstration. Jailed for ten days, I met several activists who were finding ways to link teaching and education with deep and fundamental social change. They were following Dewey and DuBois, King and Helen Keller who wrote: "We can't have education without revolution. We have tried peace education for 1,900 years and it has failed. Let us try revolution and see what it will do now."

and

"As students and teachers begin to see themselves as linked to one another, as tied to history and capable of collective action, the fundamental message of teaching shifts slightly, and becomes broader, more generous: we must change ourselves as we come together to change the world. Teaching invites transformations, it urges revolutions small and large. La educacion es revolucion!"

Using the word "revolution" in a speech is so far off the mark of a policy agenda, that I am amazed that even you buy this nonsense. If I say that I have revolutionized the peeling of a potato, will I be developing a cult of personality in the field of spuds akin to a communist and/or socialist government?

You can dislike President Obama until the moon turns into blue cheese for all that I care. President Obama was elected as president by a MAJORITY of the citizens of the US (unlike other presidents). This man had a huge "ground swell" of support with the notion of "real change", which I believe is nonsense (both political parties are irreparably corrected as far as I am concerned). The only thing that I am concerned about is his trying to fix real problems in this country. If he does so, GREAT and give him four more years, if not, send in the next person from one of the corrupted parties to try and do better. You are still stuck on a failed notion. Once again, what are you doing to help fix the problems in this country? Maybe we can come up with some constructive ideas, rather than get boggled down in trivial, useless nitpicking of nonsense.

Once again, what are you doing to help fix the problems in this country? Maybe we can come up with some constructive ideas, rather than get boggled down in trivial, useless nitpicking of nonsense.

Hmmmm.... why not debate David's premise instead of turning the argument into a defense of David? What you're doing is called an ad hominem response, Marc.

To note some of the other posts, let's be clear that Mao, Stalin, and Hitler used the idea that the common working man was their cause, even though they used that idea simply to usurp power. The Nazis, the Fascists, and the Communists all had massive labor-union support (as does Obama), going in. The idea that "fascists" were somehow "conservatives is a simple example of how history has been distorted in the telling. The "Fascist" symbol of a wheat sheaf was a symbol of labor-union power. At the time of their takeovers, Lenin, Hitler, and Mussolini were popular, the mainstream medias supported them, progressives supported them, and many in the U.S. (where socialism was the trendy thing to do and what many school/college professors favored) supported Hitler, "Uncle Joe" Stalin, and Mussolini. One of the cute parts about the Obama campaign (IMO) was the prevalence of Obama portraits on campaign posters that were eerily reminiscent of Stalin and Mao posters (easy to research on Google).

BTW, immediately upon coming into office, Obama began to do the unions' bidding. On his second day in office, Obama signed an executive order to rescind one that required unions to post notices that union-members did not have to let their dues be used for political purposes. Here's a commentary on other things Obama has done for unions. Pretend it was Bush or some conservative... in no case would I allow any president of the U.S. to engage in this kind of behaviour; I'd be screaming. Notice the silence from the MSM and Obama supporters:

So David's comparison of school-children being taught to extol Obama is not really far off the mark. Probably you can find a way to acknowledge his point and then argue it without having to bring David personally into the argument?

Hmmmm.... why not debate David's premise instead of turning the argument into a defense of David? What you're doing is called an ad hominem response, Marc.

To note some of the other posts, let's be clear that Mao, Stalin, and Hitler used the idea that the common working man was their cause, even though they used that idea simply to usurp power. The Nazis, the Fascists, and the Communists all had massive labor-union support (as does Obama), going in. The idea that "fascists" were somehow "conservatives is a simple example of how history has been distorted in the telling. The "Fascist" symbol of a wheat sheaf was a symbol of labor-union power. At the time of their takeovers, Lenin, Hitler, and Mussolini were popular, the mainstream medias supported them, progressives supported them, and many in the U.S. (where socialism was the trendy thing to do and what many school/college professors favored) supported Hitler, "Uncle Joe" Stalin, and Mussolini. One of the cute parts about the Obama campaign (IMO) was the prevalence of Obama portraits on campaign posters that were eerily reminiscent of Stalin and Mao posters (easy to research on Google).

BTW, immediately upon coming into office, Obama began to do the unions' bidding. On his second day in office, Obama signed an executive order to rescind one that required unions to post notices that union-members did not have to let their dues be used for political purposes. Here's a commentary on other things Obama has done for unions. Pretend it was Bush or some conservative... in no case would I allow any president of the U.S. to engage in this kind of behaviour; I'd be screaming. Notice the silence from the MSM and Obama supporters:

So David's comparison of school-children being taught to extol Obama is not really far off the mark. Probably you can find a way to acknowledge his point and then argue it without having to bring David personally into the argument?

Best.

Mike Sigman

Mike:

I figured that you could not keep yourself out of this thread for very long . Once again, the comparison is pathetic at best. The well orchestrated propaganda machines that Stalin and Mao ran were part of their government and how it functioned. I find it sad that the same people advocating this nonsense do not extend that ridiculous comparison to the previous administration. We could do this by pointing out the the calling of dissent as being against the country. Advocating a fear of certain foreigners, religions....I could easily lower myself to that level, but those comparisons are also nonsense. What is happening now with the idealization of the current president is very similar to what happened when President Reagan was in office.
I seem to remember that when I was in school, a current president was always extolled in the classrooms. This went along with the pledge of allegiance, the national anthem and other things that are not as common as today. Some schools want to extol the current president, while others would like to "protect" their students from having the president address them. SO WHAT! The only thing that this points out is how polarized our country has become for all of the wrong reasons. No wonder our country has so many problems. Our citizens have become fixated on the nonsense that the politicians and news media force feeds them.

Why don't we focus on real issues rather than spinning threads from smoke.

I figured that you could not keep yourself out of this thread for very long . Once again, the comparison is pathetic at best. The well orchestrated propaganda machines that Stalin and Mao ran were part of their government and how it functioned.

Sure, once the regimes were established the government forced those kinds of measures. However, in the case of Lenin, Mussolini, and Hitler there was a lot of support from the progressive and union-supporting populace. You may not understand it, but at the time it was very trendy to be progressive, liberal, and socialist in Europe; American "intelligentsia" openly supported those causes. Only when the real effects came to light did everyone deny that they'd ever supported socialist and communist-related causes. There was a good book out on how many Germans supported Hitler (he was a union supporter and a socialist) and yet how many declared after the war that they'd never been taken in and it was all a mistake to think they'd gone along with it.

Quote:

I find it sad that the same people advocating this nonsense do not extend that ridiculous comparison to the previous administration.

Bush had his education department setting up lesson plans where it was suggested that children discuss Bush's past quotes? We just saw that happen with Obama, Marc. So tell me where Bush did something like that... I'm more than happy to extend the comparison about school-children, as suggested by the O.P.

Quote:

We could do this by pointing out the the calling of dissent as being against the country. Advocating a fear of certain foreigners, religions....I could easily lower myself to that level, but those comparisons are also nonsense.

Aren't they also complete deviations from the topic? Perhaps worthy of some thread other than about the "cult of personality"? C'mon... if you're going to debate an issue, you can't drag in extraneous issues, trivialize other posters, etc. No fair!

Quote:

Why don't we focus on real issues rather than spinning threads from smoke.

Good point. Can you point me to your posts on the same pettinesses during the Bush administration? Trust me, I was not a Bush lover. I thought at best he was middle-manager material who would at least attempt to surround himself with various experts in domestic and foreign policy. However, when it came to the soft-white Gore, raised in a suite at the Ritz-Carlton out near the beltway, or the Kerry guy who even Ted Kennedy called a phoney, I guess Bush was the lesser of two evils. With Obama, I think the Left has made a worse bet than they did with Carter and it will cost them even more or it will cause a civil war with the sophomoric 1970's college-campus idealism/socialism. I'm sorta bemusedly waiting to see what happens.

Notice not once did I make a reference to you or your personal beliefs or say "pathetic", etc. I don't debate like that.

Thanks for being a voice of sanity. Notice how some people continue to predict civil uprising and civil war because the right no longer has a strangle hold on the nation, despite the lack of a shred of credible evidence that anything like that is even remotely on the horizon? Notice how they don't call you pathetic, but just insult your understanding of history because you haven't sampled the revisionist koolaid from the National Review? Notice how superior they assure you they are in comparison to yourself because they don't put people down? Notice how, they throw around assertions no respectable historian would tolerate in order to make outlandish comparisons based on scraps of news supported by no more than cites to right-wing ideological sites?

All of that might concern you; but don't worry they're only interested in the truth. And they do it all with a smile and a wink.

Thanks for being a voice of sanity. Notice how some people continue to predict civil uprising and civil war because the right no longer has a strangle hold on the nation, despite the lack of a shred of credible evidence that anything like that is even remotely on the horizon? Notice how they don't call you pathetic, but just insult your understanding of history because you haven't sampled the revisionist koolaid from the National Review? Notice how superior they assure you they are in comparison to yourself because they don't put people down? Notice how, they throw around assertions no respectable historian would tolerate in order to make outlandish comparisons based on scraps of news supported by no more than cites to right-wing ideological sites?

All of that might concern you; but don't worry they're only interested in the truth. And they do it all with a smile and a wink.

Lessee.... "revisionist koolaid... superior... insult... assertions no respectable historian... outlandish...". Why not add "child molester", procrastinator, and a host of other terms if all you're going to do is smear by innuendo, David? If you simply want to avoid any discussion of the topic and smear me personally, why not just start another thread?

Well, you did reply pretty promptly, so procrastination is pretty much outlandish. I have no reason to believe you have any criminal background. Starting a thread to smear would be, of course, against forum rules. And I think I've stated pretty clearly I think your theory is unsupported and insupportable, which is pretty much on topic.

Why don't you establish that your assertions are based on something valid? They are your assertions, after all, and a great deal of what you say about history appears pretty controversial -- so it's fair to put the burden of persuasion on you.

I think everyone here should be appalled at what that school is teaching the kids. Not only appalled, but afraid. To sing songs glorifying the leader smacks of schools in North Korea or any other communist country. This should piss you off whether it is singing about Obama or Bush.

Sure, once the regimes were established the government forced those kinds of measures. However, in the case of Lenin, Mussolini, and Hitler there was a lot of support from the progressive and union-supporting populace. You may not understand it, but at the time it was very trendy to be progressive, liberal, and socialist in Europe; American "intelligentsia" openly supported those causes. Only when the real effects came to light did everyone deny that they'd ever supported socialist and communist-related causes. There was a good book out on how many Germans supported Hitler (he was a union supporter and a socialist) and yet how many declared after the war that they'd never been taken in and it was all a mistake to think they'd gone along with it.

As those regimes established themselves, they began an insidious process of cloaking the workings of the government while eroding the rights of it's citizens. Once again Mike, This comparison is closer to the Bush administration than it is to the Obama administration. Once again Mike, this comparison is simply nonsense for many reasons.

Quote:

Mike Sigman wrote:

Bush had his education department setting up lesson plans where it was suggested that children discuss Bush's past quotes? We just saw that happen with Obama, Marc. So tell me where Bush did something like that... I'm more than happy to extend the comparison about school-children, as suggested by the O.P.

Let me see, President Bush. He was the guy who fought the legislative branch in Texas as it worked on improving educational standards. When he found that his veto would be over-ridden, he signed the measure and then took credit for it. This was the same president that intentionally underfunded the "No Child Left Behind" initiative. I have yet to see any official doctrine or policy issued by the US department of education where it is advising/mandating the setting up of lesson plans that extol the current president. In absence of that, you are still trying to weave a hammock out of smoke.

Quote:

Mike Sigman wrote:

Aren't they also complete deviations from the topic? Perhaps worthy of some thread other than about the "cult of personality"? C'mon... if you're going to debate an issue, you can't drag in extraneous issues, trivialize other posters, etc. No fair! Good point. Can you point me to your posts on the same pettinesses during the Bush administration? Trust me, I was not a Bush lover. I thought at best he was middle-manager material who would at least attempt to surround himself with various experts in domestic and foreign policy. However, when it came to the soft-white Gore, raised in a suite at the Ritz-Carlton out near the beltway, or the Kerry guy who even Ted Kennedy called a phoney, I guess Bush was the lesser of two evils. With Obama, I think the Left has made a worse bet than they did with Carter and it will cost them even more or it will cause a civil war with the sophomoric 1970's college-campus idealism/socialism. I'm sorta bemusedly waiting to see what happens.

Notice not once did I make a reference to you or your personal beliefs or say "pathetic", etc. I don't debate like that.

Best.

Mike

Thank you for your history lessons, simply a passive-aggressive attack on your part. You want me try and debate about a topic that is ludicrous at best?

I think that my accountant put it best when he said that he was voting for Bush because Gore was an A-Hole and thought that he knew everything. Bush was an idiot who realized that he was an idiot and surrounded himself by smart people. Interesting summary. Kerry and Bush were BOTH silver-spoon children. At least Kerry served in Nam rather than hiding in the south abusing drugs. At least Kerry was intelligent. Bush associated himself with two people who to me, seem to represent the highest levels of sociopathy and evil-> Cheney and Rove.

In my own opinion, the Obama aura has more to do with him being the first African-American President. I take a much more benign view of this process than you do. I frankly never thought that this would happen in my lifetime and I am happy that it did happen. He is a sterling role model for a set of communities that deserve better role models that genuinely give back to their communities.

I am taking a wait-and-see approach for this administration. So far, much better than President Carter and that is not saying much at all. Compare that to an eight year presidency that may very well be the WORST in modern history (Bush Administration by the way). Destroying the economy, military, politicizing government to unheard of levels, undermining civil rights, selling out it's citizens to big business.... The list went on and on.

I wrote posts about what I considered to be wrong-doings and illegal activities during the Bush administration. You can be sure that if the current administration starts to reach the levels of the past administration, I will be writing about that too. I have clearly stated on many occasions that I consider both political parties to be irreparably corrupted. President Obama is part of one of those corrupted "machines." I just happen to think that he is a better thinker than President Bush and Senator McCain are. His ideas have been corrupted by the "machine" like presidents before him and after him.

The main reason that I typically support Democrats is that the difference that I see between the parties has to do with how they view the "weakest link in the chain." I would rather see us strengthen the weakest links (typically democrats) rather than strengthen the strongest links (typically republicans). This whole issue revolves around the redistribution of wealth. When it flows upwards, the "right" does not seem to care. When it flows downwards, the "right" suddenly seems to care and calls it socialism.

From my perspective, I would prefer that we start with a clean slate based upon the following two conditions: 1) Government funds any and all political campaigns equally. No forms of contributions outside of the government should be allowed. 2) All forms of political contributions and lobbying will be considered to be what they really are- bribery and influence peddling. If it occurs, both sides go to prison. Just imagine what our country would be like if the politicians were actually beholden to the citizens and not the big businesses, organizations (big labor included)...... Unfortunately, I do not hold out much hope. This is particularly the case where the Supreme Court (of jesters?), particularly those who advocate for a strict adherence to the founding documents, some how find non-citizen entities (corporations, pacs....) entitled to the right to influence peddling/bribery-> oh sorry, Free Speech!

I think everyone here should be appalled at what that school is teaching the kids. Not only appalled, but afraid. To sing songs glorifying the leader smacks of schools in North Korea or any other communist country. This should piss you off whether it is singing about Obama or Bush.

John:

At the present time, I am neither appalled or afraid. If this were to become part of a school districts stated plans or the US department of education's stated plans, then I will be genuinely upset.

What I am upset with are the school districts in this country, that were supported both overtly and covertly by the last administration, in instituting "Creationism" into the schools as some kind of competing scientific theory to evolutionism. Spending money on soundly dis-proven religious beliefs being taught to our typically poorly educated youth is beyond the pale of reason.

I would rather deal with genuine issues that effect the education of our children, rather than the enthusiasm of some that ends up as extolling the current president.

Well, you did reply pretty promptly, so procrastination is pretty much outlandish. I have no reason to believe you have any criminal background. Starting a thread to smear would be, of course, against forum rules. And I think I've stated pretty clearly I think your theory is unsupported and insupportable, which is pretty much on topic.

Why don't you establish that your assertions are based on something valid? They are your assertions, after all, and a great deal of what you say about history appears pretty controversial -- so it's fair to put the burden of persuasion on you.